Turkey arrests over 100 suspected IS members

Turkey arrested over 100 suspected members of the Islamic State group this week, authorities said Friday, the latest mass detention targeting the terror organisation.

The country has been hit by several major attacks claimed by IS, including a 2017 nightclub shooting that killed dozens of people.

The fresh raids took place across the country, including in the capital Ankara and Turkey's largest city Istanbul, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.

The arrest of 119 people this week follows other mass detentions, including 99 announced in early August.

Since the 2019 collapse of the self-proclaimed "caliphate", some suspected IS members have settled in Turkey.

Turkish authorities said that since June 2023 more than 3,600 people with suspected ties to the jihadist group have been arrested.

Two of the assailants who massacred 145 people at the Crocus City Hall in Moscow last March, an attack for which IS claimed responsibility, had spent several weeks in Turkey before heading to Russia, according to local authorities.